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Ask HN: WhatsApp, now integral to our lives, provides no tech support. Ideas?
I am having a ton of issues with my WhatsApp account for the past few days. I am good with computers, have tried everything imaginable, and still have issues.
It helped me realize how integral it is to our "digital" life. I certainly use it more than my phone number, or any other app.
Being cut off from it makes it really annoying to deal with ordinary communications with friends, for business, etc.
WhatsApp seems to offer support, but it's not what it seems. Essentially, this is what you get:
"Unfortunately, we don’t provide chat or email support for questions about messaging at this time. Replies to this message won’t be read. Thank you for understanding."
So... you're essentially left alone. No recourse.
Any ideas of what I could do to try to solve my issue?
- lobito14 2y ago"WhatsApp, now integral to Your lives, provides no tech support. Ideas?" I corrected it for You.
- Dessesaf 2y agoYes, "our" does not necessarily include you. There is no separate word for an "us" that includes all people.
- simonebrunozzi 2y agoThanks. Now it's much better. 2B people use WhatsApp, but that doesn't include you. Forgive me if I thought so.
- high_byte 2y agoseems to be becoming the norm... uber eats decided to just not show up. can't contact driver. can't contact uber. why offer support if you have a billion users? sounds like massive overhead. so lose a few users, it's cheaper.
- Bluestein 2y ago(I am sure this has been studied to death ... At what point, at what scale, (ie. 1bn. users) does it become humanly impossible to offer support? To scale offering "human" support, that is.- At some point the "right to talk to a human" will become regulated ...
- bouke 2y agoOr look at it from a different angle: at what scale (ie. 1bn. users) does it become possible to stop to offer support? Simply don’t care about those users with issues or questions.
- coldtrait 2y agoI've been able to get some basic support and it gets followed up via WhatsApp Support but it was something basic, like I had a question about my backup data and couldn't figure out why I could not access older images/videos despite having data backed up but they couldn't provide much support. I assume WhatsApp Business provides better support?
- Bluestein 2y agoPS. At this point, I think they should just forcibly convert WhatsApp into a project of the United Nations :)
- Bluestein 2y ago(Just wanted to take the time to appreciate the downvote ...)
- daydream 2y ago> Any ideas of what I could do to try to solve my issue? What specific problems are you having?
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- christophilus 2y ago> Being cut off from it makes it really annoying to deal with ordinary communications with friends, for business, etc. As someone who has never used WhatsApp, why is it annoying to communicate without it?
- carlos_rpn 2y agoI do not know where op is from, but here in Brazil, where whatsapp is huge, there's a huge expectation you'll be reacheable on whatsapp, both in and out of work.
- codingdave 2y agoThat is definitely not universal - I've never used it, and it seems to be just for teenagers in my area. (Rural Midwestern USA)
- carlosjobim 2y agoSouth America: Whatsapp Northern Europe: Facebook messenger United States: SMS/iMessage
- meiraleal 2y agowhich is quite fun. Does SMS/iMessage support groups, bots or any kind of automation? Americans stopped in the stone age.
- BOOSTERHIDROGEN 2y agoThat is why Discord is huge in US while the rest of the world telegram, fb, WhatsApp.
- codingdave 2y ago> stopped in the stone age. And pleasantly so. I actually barely even text - I tell friends to send me an email, or even better just show up at my door and we'll hang out. I get that I'm an outlier, but I enjoy having my digital communications be for work, and my "real" life being offline.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- cpach 2y agoHave you considered migrating to another platform? For example Signal. They offer better security and there seems to be support options AFAICT: https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/6746004451610-Contact-Us https://support.signal.org/hc/en-us/articles/6746004451610-C...
- Two4 2y agoAs someone who quit WhatsApp a while back when there was a big scare about a change in ToS (and everyone was promising to jump ship to telegram/signal), I cannot overstate the importance of the network effect. For a platform with a userbase this size, the critical mass of users required to pull everyone over to a new platform is simply massive. I'm on both other platforms, and although I see many of my contacts there, they are simply not active. They prefer WhatsApp, and unless something cataclysmic happens, they'll remain there.
- cpach 2y agoI hear ya. I also use WhatsApp a lot. But if OP has issues that makes WhatsApp unusable, and the owner of the platform refuse to offer support, how to proceed…? Even if the network effect is strong, at that point I would seek out alternatives.
- muzani 2y agoI would be very happy if people migrated to another platform. Second best here is Telegram, but it's impossible to get everyone there. It's heavily used for government communication, scams, and affairs/prostitution.
- ThePowerOfFuet 2y agoSome who know far more about security than I suspect that Telegram is a honeypot. I am inclined to agree.
- meiraleal 2y agoFor Americans, yes. The same way whatsapp is a honeypot for everyone else.
- meiraleal 2y agoHow do you offer chat/email support to 1 billion people? That's obviously impossible.
- waldrews 2y agoYou don't do it for free, but you also don't charge so much it becomes a profit center and screws up incentives.
- ksec 2y ago>Any ideas of what I could do to try to solve my issue? I mean, written down the issue is 50% of the problem.
- aristofun 2y agoWhatsapp has always been a piece of sh*. When Durov said it from stage everyone were mocking him. But the truth is for better or worth Telegram is the only messenger today that doesn’t suck as a mass product for end user.